1. Field of the Invention
A hand-operated, small kitchen appliance to prepare coffee, tea, soy, rice, milk and/or egg beverages, froths and desserts. The kitchen appliance homogenizes saturated and unsaturated fat into skim milk, milk, cream, soy, rice, egg and similar foodstuff. The kitchen appliance is used to microwave-roast green coffee beans, soy beans, rice grains and similar beans and grains to provide microwave-roasted snacks, beverages, froths and desserts. Both alcoholic and nonalcoholic beverages and desserts, with and without foam toppings, are described frozen, chilled or heated. Semi-permanent, nylon-mesh filters replace disposable paper filters.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
Hand operated French Press coffee makers are well known. Hand operated milk frothing apparatus are well known, for example the apparatus taught in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,580,169 and 5,780,087.
My U.S. Pat. No. 5,635,233, "Methods for Preparing a Coffee, Tea or Milk Beverage," teaches separating the plunger-strainer of the French Press coffee maker into a plunger member and a contiguous filter member.
My U.S. Pat. No. 5,800,852, "A Coffee/Tea, Table Blender and Microwave Oven Apparatus and Methods for Its Use," teaches to combine the utility of a conventional blender and a microwave oven. U.S. Pat. No. 5,800,852, teaches to blend and brew, in the jar of a table blender, coffee, tea or herbal tea immersed in a liquid. Then the brewing coffee, tea or herbal tea, in the blender jar, is removed from its motor base. The blender jar containing the still brewing beverage is placed into a microwave oven, exposed to microwave energy and heated. The blender jar, containing the microwave heated, still-brewing beverage, is returned to its motor base and the blender motor is energized to finish brewing the beverage. The finished brew is filtered out of the blender jar through a reusable filter that covers the blender jar. The instant invention is useful to prepare a cappuccino-type froth for use on top of a beverage prepared in my table-blender/microwave-oven coffee, tea and herbal tea apparatus.
My copending U.S. Pat. No. 5,925,394 for "Methods for Denaturing and Whipping into a Foam Certain Denaturable Proteins Found in Milk Products and Egg Products" teaches how to produce long-lasting milk and egg froths and how to increase the fat content of the resulting product. This copending application concerns electric mixers. This copending application teaches that, if desired, alcohol can be used.
My copending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/715,396, filed Sep. 13, 1996, for "Methods of Freezing and Defrosting Certain Foodstuffs in a Microwave Oven," teaches how to freeze and dispense frozen froths and desserts.
Prior-art, hand-operated, milk-frothing apparatus, when operated rapidly, repeatedly up and down, permit liquid fat and coffee ground to by-pass and/or block the frother member. Prior art electric table blender, the hand operated beaters and electric mixers can permit a by-pass of liquid fat when blending and mixing the liquid-fat, milk and egg mixtures, taught herein.
It is well known that commercial equipment exists to homogenize fat in milk. Soy milk and rice milk are well known commodities.